Cuphead (Character)

Articles about Cuphead	Game • TV Series

Summary

Cuphead is the titular main protagonist of an indie game baring the same name. He and his younger brother, Mugman, go on a winning spree at the craps table. Once the Devil joined the fray, he made a bet with the two brothers; if they won, they get all the loot in the casino, but if they lose, the Devil takes their souls. Cuphead, blinded by greed, rolls a snake eyes, losing the bet. Cuphead and Mugman, begging for their lives, talk the Devil into an alternative, so then the two of them go on a quest to collect the soul contracts of the Devil's debtors by midnight.

Powers and Stats

Tier: 9-B | 9-A | At least 8-A, likely Low 7-B

Key: Early Game (Inkwell Isle I) | Mid Game (Inkwell Isle II/III) | End Game/DLC (Inkwell Hell/The Delicious Last Course)

Name: Cuphead

Origin: Cuphead

Gender: Male

Age: At least 10 (Stated to be an Adolescent by Evan Skolnick, and is shown attending Inkwell Elementary in the book Carnival Chaos)

Classification: Anthropomorphic cup

Powers and Abilities:

• Cuphead ▾
• With Airplane

• Early Game (Inkwell Isle I)
• Mid to End Game (Inkwell Isle II to Inkwell Hell)
• The Delicious Last Course

• Superhuman Physical Characteristics
  • Small Size (Type 0; While Cuphead's size varies between levels, he is canonically around 91 cm tall)
• Toon Force (Cuphead and Mugman can take off their heads and put them back on without issue)
  • Regeneration (High-Low; When Ms. Chalice takes their place, Cuphead or Mugman's noses are accidentally destroyed by the portal closing on them, only to regenerate off-screen by the time they are playable again)
• Vehicular Mastery (Capable of very competently piloting planes against a variety of deadly foes)
• Magic (Cuphead's abilities are said to be magical in nature)
  • Homing Attack (Chaser homes in onto foes)
  • Explosion Manipulation (The Charge shot's Radial Barrage releases an energy explosion)
  • Instinctive Action (P. Sugar makes the first parry per jump be performed automatically)
  • Weapon Creation (Whetstone allows Cuphead to briefly shape his straw into an axe)
  • Minor Afterimage Creation (Briefly casts afterimages when using Super Arts)
• Acrobatics (Hypermobility; Cuphead pulls off repeated frontflips with every jump, which he can do while constantly firing in the same direction and dodging attacks)
• Energy Projection (Cuphead fights by firing energy out of his fingertips)
• Limited Power Nullification (Can negate most projectiles by Parrying them, but only if they're pink)
• Resurrection & Non-Physical Interaction (Ghost, Intangibility [Elemental & Immaterial] & Soul; Capable of resurrecting others by parrying their souls. Parry can also be used to destroy ghosts, who are otherwise intangible to attacks. Normal attacks are still capable of destroying beings made of flames)
• Accelerated Development (Cuphead and his pal Mugman's power increased greatly through the events of the game, despite the entirety of it taking place over the course of less than a single day)
• Statistics Amplification & Statistics Reduction (The Heart Charm adds an additional hit point but lightly weakens attack power)
• Smoke Manipulation & Limited Invisibility (Smoke Bomb briefly renders Cuphead invisible and leaves behind a cloud of smoke when performed)

All previous abilities plus:

• Intangibility & Minor Dimensional Travel (With Invincibility, Cuphead crosses the astral plane to briefly become invincible)
• Astral Projection (With Giant Ghost Cuphead attacks with their spirit and body at once shaping the former into a muscular body that delivers a lariat)

All previous abilities plus:

• Summoning (The Crackshot's P. Turret a UFO that shoots energy blasts at foes)
• Electricity Manipulation (Converge rapidly shoots bolts of electricity)
• Air Manipulation (Twist-Up rapid-fires tiny tornadoes)
• Curse Manipulation & Blessed (With Cursed Relic and Divine Relic respectively)
• Astral Cookie:
  • Limited Resurrection (The Astral Cookie can resurrect Miss Chalice, but only temporarily, and the one eating it will swap places with her)
  • Portal Creation (The Astral Cookie will open a portal to the Astral Plane, allowing Ms. Chalice to take the place of the one eating it)
• Divine Relic:
  • More Afterimage Creation (Creates cyan afterimages with Divine Relic by moving)
  • Power Nullification (Can parry any attack using the Divine Relic with the first parry, removing the attack from the screen, however it doesn't add to his Super Meter)

• Flight, Explosion Manipulation & Transformation (Can turn into a Super Bomb and blow up on foes, unarmed by his own explosion, and also shoot bombs)
• Size Manipulation (Can shrink himself to avoid bullets and increase his speed)
• Minor Power Nullification, Resurrection & Non-Physical Interaction (Intangibility [Elemental]; Still capable of Parrying. Can harm Hilda Berg while she is made of clouds)

Attack Potency: Wall level+ (Defeated Goopy Le Grande, who is capable of attacking with this much strength) | Small Building level+ (Can smash huge column pieces. Elder Kettle noticed that his strength was increasing) | At least Multi-City Block level (Comparable to Chef Saltbaker, who destroyed the inside of his massive basement), likely Small City level (Can fight and defeat the mountain-sized giant Glumstone, as well as the Devil, who was implied to be stronger)

Speed: Subsonic (Comparable to Goopy Le Grande, who can attack this fast), at least Supersonic flight speed (Cuphead's plane can fly at least this fast) | Transonic combat and movement speed, Supersonic movement speed in short bursts and Supersonic+ attack speed (Superior in speed to cannonballs), at least Supersonic flight speed | Transonic combat and movement speed, Supersonic movement speed in short bursts and Supersonic+ attack speed, at least Supersonic flight speed

Lifting Strength: Unknown, likely Below Average Human (Due to small size)

Striking Strength: Wall level+ | Small Building level+ | At least Multi-City Block level, possibly Small City level

Durability: Wall level+ | Small Building level+ | At least Multi-City Block level, possibly Small City level

Stamina: Superhuman (Fought almost 30 different bosses and through several stages all in one day with no signs of exhaustion. Can fight at cloud height without experiencing symptoms from oxygen rarefaction)

Range: Tens of Meters, higher with Plane

Standard Equipment: Equipment: Two Shots, two Charms and one Super Art out of the following.

• Shots
• Super Arts
• Charms

• Shots: Energy attacks usually rapid-fired from Cuphead/Mugman's finger. Each, at the expense of some of the same energy that is used to cast Supers, can shoot a more powerful "EX" attack.
  • Peashooter: A straight rapid fire attack. Average power.
    • Mega Blast (EX): A large energy ball is shot forward.
  • Spread: A rapid-fire shot that shoots a fan of five bullets at once, though with limited range. Very powerful if all hit.
    • Eight Way (EX): Cuphead/Mugman shoots eight large Spread bullets, one in each cardinal and diagonal direction.
  • Chaser: A rapid-fire, somewhat low power homing shot.
    • Chaos Orbit (EX): Spawns several larger Chaser shots that orbit around Cuphead/Mugman.
  • Lobber: A shot type that fires slower than Peashooter, and is affected by gravity, but bounces off the ground and deals more damage.
    • Kablooey (EX): Shoots a massive Lobber shot.
  • Charge: The only shot type that doesn't rapid-fire. Instead, it builds up power, to release into a single, super-powerful shot.
    • Radial Barrage (EX): A somewhat short-range but powerful explosion.
  • Roundabout: After crossing a certain distance, these disk-shaped shots come back like a boomerang.
    • Jumbo Rebound (EX): Shoots a buzzsaw-like massive Roundabout shot.
  • Crackshot: Shoots straight energy shots that after a distance break into weaker projectiles that re-aim at foes.
    • P. Turret (EX): Summons a UFO that shoots energy blasts at foes.
  • Converge: Full-screen, piercing 3-way shot. The user can narrow the shot spread by aiming more carefully.
    • Electro-Bolt (EX): A large, instant beam of electricity.
  • Twist-Up: A rapid-fire tornado shot that arcs upwards. Average damage.
    • Cyclone Spiral (EX): Summons a bigger cyclone that briefly spins around the area in an increasing radius before leaving.

• Super Arts
  • Energy Beam: A devastating horizontal attack spills from the user's head.
  • Invincibility: The user crosses the astral plane to briefly become invincible.
  • Giant Ghost: The user attacks with their spirit and body at once shaping the former into a muscular body that delivers a lariat.

• Charms: Charms up to Whetstone are available to the first keys, while Astral Cookie and onward are exclusive to the Delicious Last Course.
  • Heart: Adds an additional hit point but lightly weakens attack power.
  • Smoke Bomb: The user will not take damage during a dash, becoming briefly intangible as they do.
  • P. Sugar: The first parry move per jump is automatic.
  • Coffee: Super meter continuously fills, in addition to what would normally be earned by dealing damage.
  • Twin Heart: Adds two additional hit points but weakens attack power.
  • Whetstone: The first parry of each jump doubles as a damaging axe attack.
  • Astral Cookie: Play as Ms. Chalice and gain access to her moveset.
  • Heart Ring: Restores one HP for the first, third, and sixth parry.
  • Broken Relic: A simple bauble of unknown origin. Can be "upgraded" into the Cursed Relic by defeating a certain boss.
    • Cursed Relic: A jinxed curio that reduces the wearer's HP to 1 and randomizes Shot types every time they begin shooting. Can be upgraded into Divine Relic by defeating enough bosses.
      • Divine Relic: A wondrous talisman that grants the abilities of Smoke Bomb, Whetstone, and Heart Ring, as well as an improved version of Coffee's, and switches Shot types every time they begin firing.

Intelligence: Above Average (Outsmarted someone smart enough to build gigantic robots and the devil himself)

Weaknesses: Greedy (Willingly gambled his soul in a game with the Devil for all the money in the Casino), attacks are almost entirely range based, size manipulation only works on himself, cannot be revived without the presence of Mugman

Note: The amount of coins available by the end of each isle in the main game is respectively 15, 28, 39 and 40. This is important because items can only be bought from the shop in order, and as such, not all of them are available to the earlier keys. The total cost of all weapons/charms is 20/20, though 8/5 can be saved by never buying the most expensive one available. As a result, the Charm "Twin Heart" (Total coin amount needed: 18) is not available to Cuphead/Mugman in the first island. All weapons and other charms can be purchased by then. Note that Delicious Last Course weapons are only available in that DLC.

Notable Matchups

Victories:

• Charizard (Pokémon) Charizard's Profile (Speed was equalized, starting distance was 20 meters, End Game Cuphead and Charmander were used)

• Garnet (Multiversus) Garnet's Profile (Early Game Cuphead used; Starting distance was 20 meters; Battle took place in Inkwell Isle I; Speed was equalized)

• The Hunter (Carnivores) The Hunter's Profile (Speed was equalized, First key hunter and early game Cuphead were used, Cuphead was restricted to his peashooter weapon and energy beam super arts, starting distance was 20ft, and the battle takes place in Paris, France)

• Beebo (Robot 64) Beebo's Profile (Mid-Game Cuphead was used; Staring distance was 5 meters; Battle took place in Inkwell Hell; Speed was equalized)

Losses:

• Inkling (Splatoon) Inkling's Profile (Both were 9-B; Speed was equalized)

Inconclusive:

• Peppino Spaghetti (Pizza Tower) Peppino's Profile (9-A versions used; Battle took place in Bangkok, Thailand; Starting Distance was 10 meters; Speed was equalized)

Discussions

Discussion threads involving Cuphead (Character)